The War on Terrorism

Well, some good news and some bad news concerning the grieving families and the charities.

The good news first.  Mayor Giuliani saying the Twin Towers Fund set up to benefit the families of the slain New York City firefighters and police officers will begin sending out checks.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MAYOR RUDY GIULIANI (R), NEW YORK:  There's been some discussion about the different charities and getting money out, and we're very sensitive to that, and we want to make sure that the money gets in the right hands.

So what we're going to do with -- the Twin Towers Fund is now about $85 million.  It always gets reported as more, but the actual money that it has is $85 million.

We're going to distribute immediately half of it so that each family -- certainly each family that has children will be getting a check for at least a hundred thousand dollars.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

O'REILLY:  Well, The Wall Street Journal should be applauded for breaking the Twin Towers story with the The Factor backing it up last night.  Of course, we're happy the money will now be going out.

The bad news is that some Hollywood stars continue to act in a very bizarre manner.  We'll tell you what Tom Hanks and Faith Hill are saying a bit later on.

The "Talking Points" memo this afternoon is about the war on terrorism.

Obviously, it's a very difficult situation, one that requires an almost surgical precision.  The coward bin Laden and his pals continue to hide under ground.  Close combat will be necessary to kill him remove the Taliban.

At the same time, there are thousands of other terrorists outside of Afghanistan, and these people should be dealt with as well.

The Factor has learned that President Bush has okayed a strategy of direct action against these terrorists.  That means that, while President Reagan's executive order of December 4th, 1981, which prohibited assassinations by any person associated with the United States, is still in force, an exception is being made.  That exception is contained in the United Nations charter, Article 51, which says that violent action can be taken against a, quote, "continuing threat."

This is smart.  The way to wage this war on terrorism is to assassinate known terrorists, including those who fund and launder money for violent organizations.  The CIA has a list of people worldwide who are suspected of terror.  If there is compelling evidence attached to those names, those people should be quietly killed.

I hate to say this, but you have to fight terror with terror.  The Geneva Convention does not apply anymore.  It is quite clear that Osama bin Laden and Adolf  Hitler are the same person.  They will kill anyone using any method.  When you have babies getting anthrax, all conventional rules of warfare are off.

Does anyone doubt that Al Qaeda would use nuclear weapons if it had them?  The world cannot wait and see what these psychopaths will do next.

The power of America must now be used proactively.  We must kill these people as they sleep, destroy them where they live, without headlines, without guilt.

The federal government has an overwhelming mandate: Protect the people of America.  Let the protecting begin.

And that's the memo.

The Most Ridiculous Item of the Day

Time now for "The Most Ridiculous Item of the Day." 

I can't figure it out, but many Americans love these car chases.  Today in Dallas, the cops spent more than an hour trying to pull over a truck (footage of the chase shown on the screen) that was on fire and zooming all over the place.  Many national news outlets covered the situation, including Fox News.

And they finally got this idiot,  whatever he was doing.  He gave up.  The cops dragged his name.  We don't know his name.  I don't care about his name, to you the truth.

Oh, what do I think?  Five years?  Five years for this guy?  Yeah, that's good.  The situation is ridiculous.  You know, and the national coverage is ridiculous.  We got to understand, people want this.  So what are we going to do here, you know?

If I'm the program director and I know we're going to get a rating for 15 minutes, I'll put it on.  Doesn't hurt anybody.  Glad they got the guy.

— You can watch Bill O'Reilly's Talking Points weeknights at 8 & 11p.m. ET.  And send your comments to: oreilly@foxnews.com